Benjamin Murphy

The City of London Corporation has recently lodged an application for the renaming of a portion of Liverpool Street, through the Street Naming and Numbering process, in accordance with The London Buildings Act (Amendment) Act 1939.

The section of Liverpool Street impacted is the pedestrianised area around the new Elizabeth Line entrance on Blomfield Street.

The application is to rename the proposed area “Sir Nicholas Winton Square”, in honour of the late Sir Nicholas Winton MBE for the significant role he played in the Kindertransport in the late 1930s, which ultimately saved 669 children, most of them Jewish, from Czechoslovakia.

I have recently written about the 85th Anniversary of Kindertransport and the critical role which Liverpool Street Station played both as part of the Kindertransport campaign and since with the permanent memorial, which we recognise, particularly on Holocaust Memorial Day.

The City Corporation has engaged with the Sir Nicholas Winton Memorial Trust, who have expressed their enthusiastic support for the initiative, which will serve as a lasting tribute to Sir Nicholas Winton and as an educational landmark.

The formal consultation process is now open and closes on 25^th April 2024. We are inviting any views and representations to be made to snn@cityoflondon.gov.uk.

Sir Nicholas was no stranger to Liverpool Street, as a former London Stock Exchange Broker. In 2009, a tribute “Winton Train” carried some of the individuals Sir Nicholas arranged to have transported to safety in 1939, along with their families, as it retraced the original Kindertransport route taken by the trains on which they rode as children to safety in Great Britain 70 years earlier. The Winton Train departed from Prague on 1 September 2009, the 70th anniversary, and travelled through Germany and the Netherlands. After a transfer by ferry to Harwich, the journey resumed by train again to arrive in London’s Liverpool Street station on 4 September, where it was met by the 100-year-old Sir Nicholas himself.

On 21st May 2011, Sir Nicholas Winton also rededicated the memorial on the main concourse of Liverpool Street Station known as “Für das Kind – Displaced” by Flor Kent. This memorial commemorates the greatness of ordinary people in extraordinary times. It links together London’s Liverpool Street Station, Hlavní Nádraží Station in Prague and Westbahnnhof Station in Vienna.

Sir Nicholas received his Freedom of the City of London on 23rd February 2015 at the Guildhall for his remarkable contribution in saving so many lives and in working tirelessly to educate others and inspire future generations to show kindness wherever possible.